Big win for MidCentral Health's patients

19/08/2011 | Big Win for MCH's Patients

A new system, which will increase the quality of care and patient safety, and enable clinicians to work more productively, has been given the green light by MidCentral District Health Board this week.

The introduction of Concerto Clinical Workstation will give doctors and other clinicians quick and easy access to patient information essential to supporting sound clinical decision-making and providing high quality patient care.

The reliance on retrieving paper records in a timely manner and accessing multiple clinical and departmental information systems will become a thing of the past. As will the complexities of locating complete records when patients receive care in different locations and by different parts of the health sector.

Concerto Clinical Workstation will enable clinicians to view accurate and comprehensive patient information via a single, secure web-based system. This new system will be available from April next year.

Chief Medical Officer, Dr Kenneth Clark says: “Clinicians need up-to-date patient information, and for the actions of each clinician to be documented and available to all others caring for the patient. This information must be available at the point of care. Concerto Clinical Workstation provides exactly what we need.”

Of the 20 district health boards in New Zealand, 16 are already using clinical workstation technology. Within the central region Orion Health, the predominant clinical workstation supplier in this country, has implemented Concerto Clinical Workstation at Whanganui DHB as well as at Wairarapa, Capital and Coast and Hutt Valley DHBs.

Orion Health Limited will be working with MDHB staff to implement, support Concerto Clinical Workstation. The $1.5M project budget includes changes to some existing systems to make them compatible with Concerto Clinical Workstation, such as the patient administration system which is used for managing admissions, theatre and outpatients lists, discharges, and transfers.

Regional implementation of Concerto Clinical Workstation, enabling all clinicians in the six DHBs of the Central Region (Capital & Coast, Hawke’s Bay, Hutt Valley, MidCentral, Wairarapa and Whanganui DHBs) to easily view patient information held in a shared clinical data repository, is currently being considered.

Contact: Communications Unit (06) 350-8945